Robot Path Planning and Cooperation


Book Description

This book presents extensive research on two main problems in robotics: the path planning problem and the multi-robot task allocation problem. It is the first book to provide a comprehensive solution for using these techniques in large-scale environments containing randomly scattered obstacles. The research conducted resulted in tangible results both in theory and in practice. For path planning, new algorithms for large-scale problems are devised and implemented and integrated into the Robot Operating System (ROS). The book also discusses the parallelism advantage of cloud computing techniques to solve the path planning problem, and, for multi-robot task allocation, it addresses the task assignment problem and the multiple traveling salesman problem for mobile robots applications. In addition, four new algorithms have been devised to investigate the cooperation issues with extensive simulations and comparative performance evaluation. The algorithms are implemented and simulated in MATLAB and Webots.




Robot Motion Planning


Book Description

One of the ultimate goals in Robotics is to create autonomous robots. Such robots will accept high-level descriptions of tasks and will execute them without further human intervention. The input descriptions will specify what the user wants done rather than how to do it. The robots will be any kind of versatile mechanical device equipped with actuators and sensors under the control of a computing system. Making progress toward autonomous robots is of major practical inter est in a wide variety of application domains including manufacturing, construction, waste management, space exploration, undersea work, as sistance for the disabled, and medical surgery. It is also of great technical interest, especially for Computer Science, because it raises challenging and rich computational issues from which new concepts of broad useful ness are likely to emerge. Developing the technologies necessary for autonomous robots is a formidable undertaking with deep interweaved ramifications in auto mated reasoning, perception and control. It raises many important prob lems. One of them - motion planning - is the central theme of this book. It can be loosely stated as follows: How can a robot decide what motions to perform in order to achieve goal arrangements of physical objects? This capability is eminently necessary since, by definition, a robot accomplishes tasks by moving in the real world. The minimum one would expect from an autonomous robot is the ability to plan its x Preface own motions.




Robotic Systems: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications


Book Description

Through expanded intelligence, the use of robotics has fundamentally transformed a variety of fields, including manufacturing, aerospace, medicine, social services, and agriculture. Continued research on robotic design is critical to solving various dynamic obstacles individuals, enterprises, and humanity at large face on a daily basis. Robotic Systems: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications is a vital reference source that delves into the current issues, methodologies, and trends relating to advanced robotic technology in the modern world. Highlighting a range of topics such as mechatronics, cybernetics, and human-computer interaction, this multi-volume book is ideally designed for robotics engineers, mechanical engineers, robotics technicians, operators, software engineers, designers, programmers, industry professionals, researchers, students, academicians, and computer practitioners seeking current research on developing innovative ideas for intelligent and autonomous robotics systems.




Mobile Robots Navigation


Book Description

The presence of mobile robots in diverse scenarios is considerably increasing to perform a variety of tasks. Among them, many developments have occurred in the fields of ground, underwater, and flying robotics. Independent of the environment where they move, navigation is a fundamental ability of mobile robots so that they can autonomously complete high-level tasks. This problem can be efficiently addressed through the following actions: First, it is necessary to perceive the environment in which the robot has to move, and extract some relevant information (mapping problem). Second, the robot must be able to estimate its position and orientation within this environment (localization problem). With this information, a trajectory toward the target points must be planned (path planning), and the vehicle must be reactively guided along this trajectory considering either possible changes or interactions with the environment or with the user (control). Given this information, this book introduces current frameworks in these fields (mapping, localization, path planning, and control) and, in general, approaches to any problem related to the navigation of mobile robots, such as odometry, exploration, obstacle avoidance, and simulation.




Autonomous Mobile Robots and Multi-Robot Systems


Book Description

Offers a theoretical and practical guide to the communication and navigation of autonomous mobile robots and multi-robot systems This book covers the methods and algorithms for the navigation, motion planning, and control of mobile robots acting individually and in groups. It addresses methods of positioning in global and local coordinates systems, off-line and on-line path-planning, sensing and sensors fusion, algorithms of obstacle avoidance, swarming techniques and cooperative behavior. The book includes ready-to-use algorithms, numerical examples and simulations, which can be directly implemented in both simple and advanced mobile robots, and is accompanied by a website hosting codes, videos, and PowerPoint slides Autonomous Mobile Robots and Multi-Robot Systems: Motion-Planning, Communication and Swarming consists of four main parts. The first looks at the models and algorithms of navigation and motion planning in global coordinates systems with complete information about the robot’s location and velocity. The second part considers the motion of the robots in the potential field, which is defined by the environmental states of the robot's expectations and knowledge. The robot's motion in the unknown environments and the corresponding tasks of environment mapping using sensed information is covered in the third part. The fourth part deals with the multi-robot systems and swarm dynamics in two and three dimensions. Provides a self-contained, theoretical guide to understanding mobile robot control and navigation Features implementable algorithms, numerical examples, and simulations Includes coverage of models of motion in global and local coordinates systems with and without direct communication between the robots Supplemented by a companion website offering codes, videos, and PowerPoint slides Autonomous Mobile Robots and Multi-Robot Systems: Motion-Planning, Communication and Swarming is an excellent tool for researchers, lecturers, senior undergraduate and graduate students, and engineers dealing with mobile robots and related issues.




Handbook of Research on Design, Control, and Modeling of Swarm Robotics


Book Description

Studies on robotics applications have grown substantially in recent years, with swarm robotics being a relatively new area of research. Inspired by studies in swarm intelligence and robotics, swarm robotics facilitates interactions between robots as well as their interactions with the environment. The Handbook of Research on Design, Control, and Modeling of Swarm Robotics is a collection of the most important research achievements in swarm robotics thus far, covering the growing areas of design, control, and modeling of swarm robotics. This handbook serves as an essential resource for researchers, engineers, graduates, and senior undergraduates with interests in swarm robotics and its applications.




Computational Intelligence in Pattern Recognition


Book Description

This book presents practical development experiences in different areas of data analysis and pattern recognition, focusing on soft computing technologies, clustering and classification algorithms, rough set and fuzzy set theory, evolutionary computations, neural science and neural network systems, image processing, combinatorial pattern matching, social network analysis, audio and video data analysis, data mining in dynamic environments, bioinformatics, hybrid computing, big data analytics and deep learning. It also provides innovative solutions to the challenges in these areas and discusses recent developments.




Advances In Cooperative Robotics - Proceedings Of The 19th International Conference On Clawar 2016


Book Description

This book provides state-of-the-art scientific and engineering research findings and developments in the area of mobile robotics and associated support technologies around the theme of cooperative robotics. The book contains peer reviewed articles presented at the CLAWAR 2016 conference. The book contains a strong stream of papers on multi-legged locomotion and cooperative robotics. There is also a strong collection of papers on human assistive devices, notably wearable exoskeletal and prosthetic devices, and personal care robots and mobility assistance devices designed to meet the growing challenges due to the global ageing society. Robot designs based on biological inspirations and ethical concerns and issues related to the design, development and deployment of robots are also strongly featured.




Autonomy and Unmanned Vehicles


Book Description

This book addresses higher–lower level decision autonomy for autonomous vehicles, and discusses the addition of a novel architecture to cover both levels. The proposed framework’s performance and stability are subsequently investigated by employing different meta-heuristic algorithms. The performance of the proposed architecture is shown to be largely independent of the algorithms employed; the use of diverse algorithms (subjected to the real-time performance of the algorithm) does not negatively affect the system’s real-time performance. By analyzing the simulation results, the book demonstrates that the proposed model provides perfect mission timing and task management, while also guaranteeing secure deployment. Although mainly intended as a research work, the book’s review chapters and the new approaches developed here are also suitable for use in courses for advanced undergraduate or graduate students.




Computational Kinematics


Book Description

This is the proceedings of IFToMM CK 2017, the 7th International Workshop on Computational Kinematics that was held in Futuroscope-Poitiers, France in May 2017. Topics treated include: kinematic design and synthesis, computational geometry in kinematics, motion analysis and synthesis, theory of mechanisms, mechanism design, kinematical analysis of serial and parallel robots, kinematical issues in biomechanics, molecular kinematics, kinematical motion analysis and simulation, geometric constraint solvers, deployable and tensegrity structures, robot motion planning, applications of computational kinematics, education in computational kinematics, and theoretical foundations of kinematics. Kinematics is an exciting area of computational mechanics and plays a central role in a great variety of fields and industrial applications nowadays. Apart from research in pure kinematics, the field deals with problems of practical relevance that need to be solved in an interdisciplinary manner in order for new technologies to develop. The results presented in this book should be of interest for practicing and research engineers as well as Ph.D. students from the fields of mechanical and electrical engineering, computer science, and computer graphics.